Suspected Assassin Arrested Near Rawlings' House!

The much talked about presence of a combine team of police and personnel of the Bureau of National Investigations (BNI) at the entrance of former President Rawlings is rather in his interest as one man suspected to be an assassin was arrested.

The man, Albert Hamid Odinga, 59, suspected to be of a Caribbean origin and known for his alleged counter-intelligence activities was arrested in the operation which started around the Ridge residence of the former President and which aroused anxious reactions from the public.

Security sources say the closeness of the apartment where the operation took place, to the residence of Rawlings was such that the massing up of armed personnel as well as plain clothed officers might have made people jump to the conclusion that there was a swoop on the residence of the former president.

Police are investigating the circumstances under which, Odinga returned to Ghana after he was allegedly deported many years back for his espionage activities in the country.

For sometime now, intelligence reports have proved that there have been an unusual movement of people to and fro and in some cases, at odd hours at the house where he was arrested. The house is opposite that of the former president which had been completely cleared of guards and agents of Rawlings weeks ago.

The vacant house, which used to be occupied by Rawlings's former guards, looks like a perfect setting for an assassin with a gun. Records indicate that the residence has not been allocated to any public official for years although it is a government property.

The police-BNI operation attracted a lot of media speculation some of which alleged that the former president has a cache of arms in his residence and the security personnel have been detailed to retrieve them.

Both the Interior Minister and the National Security Co-ordinator were reported to have denied any knowledge of the operation, giving rise to more speculation on the matter.

The Ghanaian Chronicle reports that since the Rawlings government left office, a large number of Ghanaians living in exile in Europe and North America have returned home, some bearing pain and vengeance in their hearts against the former president.

An even larger number of those living in neighbouring West African countries in exile, particularly La C?te d'Ivoire, are soldiers including Commandos who had been chased out of the country for various reasons by the Rawlings government.

The Chronicle quotes a man familiar with the security situation as saying, "Rawlings has been very worried about the influx of people whom he may perceive as enemies into the country as soon as he lost the elections".

The feared former commander of the Recce Regiment who had been on Rawlings's most wanted list, Major Suleimana, returned in January from Liberia as one of Charles Taylor's most trusted and revered Operations Commander and may have given a hint of the sentiments of some of these returnees when he warned that JJ should know that "men are in town" and so he should not try any of his tricks of destabilisation, the Chronicle report says.

After Rawlings's June 4 anniversary statements that received widespread condemnations, there are fears that some passions have been inflamed anew giving rise to the high profile security alert around the former president's residence.